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is) 
JOSE F. NONIDEZ 
II. MATERIAL AND METHODS 
Blaps lusitanica Herbst is common in woods and uncultivated 
places near Madrid, Spain, and is usually found in the holes in- 
habited by rabbits, which it does not leave except at sunset and 
during the night. All the individuals studied were collected 
almost in the same spot, in a place known as Puerta de Hierro, 
during three consecutive years. The specimens were killed by 
means of chloroform vapor shortly after their capture. Several 
preserving fluids have been used with variable results; Bouin’s 
fluid, Lenhossek’s alcoholic sublimate, and Carazzi’s modification 
of Gilson’s fluid proved to be the best, and the most valuable slides 
were thus obtained. Zenker’s fluid and Vom Rath’s picro-acetic 
sublimate gave rather good results, but the mitochondria appear 
stained to some extent when using iron hematoxylin, and this 
hampers the accurate study of the chromosomes in the maturation 
divisions; for this reason these fluids were not used extensively. 
Flemming’s strong and weak solutions have been a complete 
failure in my hands, the testes being so large that the reagent 
penetrates with difficulty, while the thick adipose tissue envelop- 
ing the organ reduces the osmic acid and prevents its access to 
the interior of the follicles; hence only the periphery of these is 
suited for study. 
The testes embedded in paraffin were cut into sections from 
6 to 10u thick. A few stains have been used, most of the slides 
being stained with iron hematoxylin, orange G and light green as 
counterstains. The results obtained with safranin and lght 
green, after preservation with sublimate mixtures or Bouin’s 
fluid, proved to be very meager. 
I have never succeeded in making smears and hence have been 
deprived in my study of the valuable results thus to be obtained. 
Ill. THE SPERMATOGONIAL MITOSES 
Seriation of the stages. A very important and often difficult 
point in the study of spermatogenesis is the seriation of the 
stages. In Blaps the seriation is very easy on account of the 
way in which the cysts are produced. Although the latter arise 
